June 08: I see it, I want it, it's mine!

[spongebrainmaternitypants]

Welcome to our new thread .

BDQ - Rather than paying now, ask the seller for a total and s/he will update the P&P costs if they're happy to reduce the costs.

Still waiting for ebay packages here from last week. Bloomin' postal strike.

Hi Amber - Glad you're getting settled again. Ryder loves pointing at the planes too. Re: Nappy rash, I second the mel... cream that Neenz suggested. It is amazing stuff.

I rang and emailed work to say that I would like redundancy. It's all in their hands now... Just about to ring PILs to let them know that we are planning on coming across (they don't know yet!). Then SIL. Better turn tv off or Derren Brown might stick me to the sofa before we get to phone.

Oh Ry is very picky about food now too. Old favourites (tomatoes, strawberries, ham) rejected. Unless it's scrambled egg, which he loves. He just doesn't seem interested at meal times and only eats if I actually put things in his mouth by hand. Outside of meal times he's happy to eat whatever DH or I happen to be eating (my museli with yoghurt a fave).

I wish my kids would eat scrambled eggs PP! Easy, cheap, and healthy. Mine only want brown beans and grapes (or crisps, cookies etc...)

Hi everyone, sorry I havent been around for a few months. It's been hectic but now I am a lady of leisure as redundancy finally caught up with me and I finished 3 weeks ago.
Although saying that, this week has been taken up with 4 interviews and I already have 3 lined up for next week and 1 the week after!
There is too much to catch up on, can someone precis the relevant points for me please?

Hey Libralady, that is such a coincidence, I was just thinking of you today - welcome back! Sorry about redundo - good luck with the interviews. How far back do you want us to go with the round-up?

Welcome back libralady! Ditto sorry to hear about redundancies, but it's good that you have interviews lined up.

Major news things I can think of...

Amber and whinegums have both bought lovely new houses, Deb has been on tv and hoping to move back to the UK, penguin is planning a move to NZ and has just recently made contact with the father she never really new, both Viva and I are studying, essie's son Iestyn's name is pronounced YesTin, purée has had houseguests for too long, neenz has been reading too many parenting books, sponge is pretty knackered on account of being pregnant. That still leaves ktpie, allnew, abdn hiker and Ali palli (who changed her name - it's on this page). Josey and fivegomad don't really come on anymore. I can't think of anyone else, which probably means that I have missed out some people!

Taking S to get his first pair of shoes today

Thanks for eBay info penguin. I'm still waiting for a parcel that was posted nearly two weeks ago. The seller has offered to refund my payment on Monday if it's not here by then. She only mentioned the price I paid for the item -not the postage. Is this the norm?

BDQ - hello!

Obviously I'm not posting enough. Or, (and possibly more likely) I'm just not posting enough interesting stuff...

( sybil wanders off determined to get a more interesting life...)

Sorry sybil In my defence I did post at the crack of dawn!

I can break the least surprising news of the year...

We are off on holiday tomorrow, and DH has a cold and is aching. FFS.

Hi Libra. Five hasn't posted in a while. Have you had a chance to catch up with her recently? Rolf went on holiday to Ireland (I think) in the school holidays and hasn't been heard of since. AH has decided that work wasn't working for her and is now a full time SAHM. There are three PGs on the thread: Sponge, Ktpie & Puree. Umm...can't think of anything else at the moment.

Sybil I'm with you on the hunt for a more interesting life

Hi Libra - that's a lot of interviews, good luck.

Sybil - Lovely to see you.

BDQ - Fantastic summary. I'd guess it would e reasonable to not refund P&P (as presumably, she did post the item), but I haven't got much experience of this.

Spider - Enjoy your hol, I'm sure some warmer weather with make your DH feel better. (Anyone else freezing last night, I wore socks to bed I was so cold).

Feeling rough, a lot of night wakenings from baby penguin last night (two nights in a row) where he simply refused to settle and a sore itchy, scratchy, throat. Bleurgh.

Got reply from Father, still processing it though. Ironically (and accidentally I hasten to add) it appears he has lived within a 5 mile radius of me for 10 years prior to moving back to my home town.

Told IL's about NZ move. They were very happy, but seem more excited that we'll be there for Xmas than the fact that we're actually planning to live there. It's all feeling very scarily real now.

I bought a hair dye/highlighting kit yesterday. You think I'd have learnt after the orange-blond-ginger disasters of the summer. But I haven't. May post results on FB if they are (a) bloomin' awful or (b) stunningly successful.

Oh and a AIBU... AIBU to be p'd off with my sis & IL's referring to Ry as the 'cockney blondie'. I just don't like it.

Thanks PP. That is funny about the PIL's reaction.

Oh dear. I have just stomped home from the middle of town having got increasingly pissed off with DH. I was trying to get stuff for Spain, and it felt as though he was thwarting everything I think we need. He ended up telling me I was an over-protective mother because I wanted to get P one of those anti-UV swim suit things. He has just called to announce that he was buying bread for lunch when I had already been to Sainsbury's when I was with them and got a baguette. Arghhh! I feel like getting in the car for the day going out and letting him pack whilst entertaining P.

I feel better having written that down. Thanks.

SpiderW - tell DH if he thinks your being over protective, he can be in charge of making sure P is well covered in sun cream - a nightmare job! UV suits make life so much easier - I was so glad I had a couple when we were on holiday.

PP - I wouldn't like it either. One of my friends calls B 'Mr Barnacles' and I hate it.

Hi Libra, bad news about redundancy, but good on the interview front and good luck.

Cockney blondie and Mr Barnacles = ugh!. YANBU!!

Ali, what are men like? Is it cos he is ill that he is being like that? I get pretty grumpy when I feel shit. I definitely agree about the UV sunsuit. Not overprotective at all, just sensible. I am so jealous, have a good time!

Doing a round-up is fraught with difficulties cos you are bound to forget someone! You did pretty well BDQ. I am a bit suspicious of someone on ebay who says they will refund the money like that so quickly - if it were you and you had posted an item you wouldn't just refund the money would you? Wouldn't you make enquiries with the PO? What if she refunds the money then the item arrives? How much was it BTW? Not sure about the P&P actually - I bought what I thought was an Isofix base for the car seat but when it arrived it was easybase (seat belt only), she refunded me in full (postage as well) but refused to pay for what it cost me to send the item back to her (which I thought she should have paid for too as she had misdescribed the item, so I was £13 out of pocket ). I would demand the entire sum P&P too if the item does not arrive. Check with ebay disputes, they will probably have an FAQ.

PP, yes strange about the ILs, but then that's ILs for you!

We are still getting problems with settling to sleep, although once they were asleep last night they were gone for the night, just took a while to settle. They are still very snotty so I assume it's that. They have eaten a lot better today so hopefully we are coming out of it now. No need for Calpol Night last night! They are doing really well with feeding themselves too - and since feeding themselves have been doing really well with big lumps - they had eaten finger food fine and chewed it but whatever I gave them on a spoon, if it was too lumpy they just spat it out. But today they were eating big chunks of chicken, peppers and courgette which was great. I tried them with quinoa too and they ate that as well .

neenz thanks for commenting on my facebook post. How did you manage to get a consultant appt for E when she had her hernia? I was distraught yesterday when they told me that Fraser would have to wait 8 week for an appt and then another 3-4 months for surgery. I would love to speed the process up.

The horrible thing is that because it's classified as not life threatening (which it is thankfully) they don't seem to consider the fact that there's a 10% chance for emergency surgery (which is the only reason it's not life threatening FFS) in the under twos if waiting times are more than 30 days after diagnoses. With no family nearby and a DH who's often away, I don't want emergency surgery and feel like waiting 6 months is just them saying "oh well, we'll wait until we're forced" which is crap. It's getting noticeably worse to

Fortunately the hospital receptionist said she'd track the consultant down Monday and at least get us a date for the appt. I'm praying it's not over a month away. It's so hard to cope on my own as it is that the thought of having to rush into the hospital dumping DS1 at a neighbours and go through it all while DH waits for an emergency helicopter ride...

Abdn, I can only imagine how you feel with a waiting time like that. Is there any way you can pay to see the consultant privately - just for that first appointment? It's usually a couple of hundred pounds. And then you could be referred to the NHS more quickly - not great, as you'd still be joining a 3-4 month waiting list for surgery, but at least it would remove the 8 week wait at the beginning.

A nurse friend recommended doing this, she's done it a few times,and because consultants are usually doing both NHS and private work, you'd likely be seeing the same person anyway.

Neenz, I'm impressed with T & E feeding themselves and eating so well. I meant to say to you there was a BLW thread the other week, where a mum was p'd off with her MIL for spoonfeeding her DC some cottage pie. Fair enough, but then she added that DC seemed much happier and more settled afterwards!

Not looking for a ruck about BLW v purees with anyone btw, we're past that now anyhoo, but wanted to share with Neenz!

B is still getting v upset if he even thinks I'm leaving him. Doesn't bode well for Monday....

Hi guys, apologies if this is a self-obsessed post - I have read but too tired to respond! (Although special welcome back to libra, and hugs to AH for Fraser).

Well, my 'day off' turned into a day/night spent in hospital . Went to bed at 10am, still with banging headache, Alex was awake from 12 - 2am but dh looked after him. By 4am I was in terrible pain and went to get dh up (he was sleeping in the spare room so he could look after Alex without disturbing me). He phoned for the on-call doc who came and measured my BP - 160 over 100 . Straight into hospital, while our wonderful neighbour came over and looked after A.

When I got in, BP was still very high, then Bill's HB dropped dangerously low and there was talk of steriod injections and emergency sections . Luckily his HB stabilised, but they wanted me to stay in overnight last night so at 4pm yesterday I was transferred to the maternity ward for a rest - , I was opposite a woman with a newborn who cried from 12 midnight til 5am (the baby that is not the mum!).

Anyway, they took my BP throughout the night and monitored Bill. I begged to be allowed home this morning and was let out on the proviso that I rested and don't go back to work. Luckily mum and dad are here (were supposed to be having our night away tonight ) and dh is not letting me do anything.

I'm going to be monitored closely from now on (have to go back Mon and Fri next week) and will be probably not be able to go to term as the consultant suspects my BP will not go back down again and that I won't last another six weeks.

Anyway, that's my news. I'm off to watch Strictly!

Hi to all x

Just saw your message on FB - what a scary time for all of you. So, maternity leave starts here then! How many weeks are you now? I'm pleased your parents are there to look after you all but shame about your night away.So, instructions from us - do as your dh says and that is do nothing - put your feet up and rest as much as possible.((hugs))

Libra - welcome back and good luck with the interviews

Ali - great timing for illness on holiday - sounds familiar. YANBU to get a UV suit for P. Hope you have a lovely time and the sun gets rid of the man flu!!!

With purees v blw - I wonder now at this stage whether either camp is better at feeding themselves with a spoon? I have done both and now Ethan is happy to feed himself but if I give him a spoon he puts it down in favour of his hands, and he will still be spoon fed sometimes. and discuss....

Sponge - how scary! When are you supposed to be starting your maternity leave?

Abdn - hope you manage to find a way to get an appointment more quickly. It sounds horrible.

Spider - Men are rubbish to take shopping, DH always stands there with a grumpy look on his face. The worst thing is taking him to Ikea if it is busy, if anyone dares stop in front of him or steps into his path they get rammed with the trolley, very embarassing.

Penguin - glad you heard back from your father. Exciting about NZ.

Hi Libra - sounds like a lot of interviews, hope they go well.

Amber - moving is horrible isn't it. So much stress! Hope the nappy rash gets better.

Allnew - hope you get a favourable reply from work about the bonus.

BDQ - hope you get the ebay stuff sorted.

Neenz- hope the colds clear up, I think we are all coming down with them here, J is a bit stuffed up and I haven't been feeling great.

Our main problem here feeding wise is finding enough food to fill the bottomless pit. Sometimes I worry that he is like a goldfish and will actually pop before he decides to stop eating. Today he discovered a love of olives, he was pointing at one on DH's plate so he cut off a bit for him to try and then he had one cut in half and kept pointing at the jar so he had a few more. Surely 14 month old little boys aren't meant to like olives? I'm sure at some point he will discover fussy eating but it hasn't happened yet. In fact I can't think of anything he doesn't like.

Debs- x posted!

J tends to get a little sidetracked messing about with his spoon or fork so we normally save them until he has eaten most of food, otherwise we would be sat there forever while he had a mouthful then spent ten minutes banging the plate before the next mouthful. He is pretty good at using them though and amazed everyone at a work lunch the other week when he picked up my fork from my plate and proceeded to eat my chips with it, cheeky monkey!

I'm nearly 35 wks now and only had two days left at work anyway, so pleased not to have to go back!

ktpie, A loves olives - has eaten them since we first gave them to him in Feb time. He also likes scallops, artichoke, anchovies, anything in fact!

He is now feeding himself with cutlery, alternated with hands. Thankfully he's given up feeding himself yoghurt with his hands, but we did go through this stage!

Sponge - glad to hear that J isn't the only one with a passion for olives, and in fact all food.
J likes to eat yoghurt with his hands as well, and ice cream.

Sponge sorry to hear about your scare last night. I will be thinking about you lots. No having your baby whilst I am in Spain.

Thanks everyone for being nice about my mega strop earlier on. Quick update: DH got home from the shops, and we talked about it. I embarrassingly had a quick cry. He apologised "for being so exasperating to live with that it drives you to tears" , and then I had a sleep this afternoon. So, I feel alot better, but I am still feeling incredibly grumpy about EVERYTHING. Maybe it's PMT, or maybe it is just the hassle of packing for a holiday. Anyway, the packing is done (give or take the odd essential). We didn't get round to buying a sunsuit, but I think we will get one at the airport or in Spain. DH has also just turned up asking if he can bring his rather large clock radio with him. This is so he can dock the ipod. I have said no. Maybe I am being petty, but I have just packed all of P's clothes, nappies, toys, books and food, and really if there is space for a clock radio it should be used for stuff for P.

On that relaxing note, I will say bye for now. I think there is broadband in the villa, so may be able to post during the week.